Ender's Challenge
by Cookey Monsta
Summary: As far as Ender knew, the only female at Battle School was Petra. You could imagine his internal shock when a prematurely graduated Launchie was assigned to Dragon Army.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One:

As far as Ender knew, the only female at Battle School was Petra. If you had asked him whether or not there was another female attending the school, he couldn't tell you because he hadn't seen any other female while walking through the corridors of the Battle School.

Ender supposed that the reason females were so rarely accepted into Battle School was because, despite those who's personality closely resembled Petra's, were all like his sister, Valentine- soft and loving at the core. Though, Ender, unlike most of the boys attending the Battle School, knew better than to believe that. Or perhaps it was the theory that Dink Meeker had proposed upon discussing the topic during lunch one day- Dink said that  
"A female's menstrual cycle was too much for the I.F. to handle- they only make an exception for Petra, and even at times she could be too much for anyone to handle" That smart-ass comment earned a smirk from Ender and an extremely hard punch in the arm from Petra.

Ender began the day like normal. He woke up, showered, and made his way to the barracks where his soldiers would have already been showered and dressed, and by now- horsing around the barracks like the children they pretended they weren't.

"Ho, Ender" said one of his soldiers, raising a hand in the air to greet his commander.

"Ho" Ender replied stoically.

Ender pulled his desk out from atop the spare bunk that was empty- due to the lack of one soldier. He logged in, his fingers hovering over the fantasy game momentarily. He hadn't played the game since he had left Salamander Army when it was commanded by Bonzo Madrid.

As far as he knew, he beat it. They said that there was more to it- but he doubted it. Probably more small games designed for the Launchies to play in their spare tine.

His finger moved to open his physics homework when a message rolled across the screen.

_New Soldier Recruit_

_Name: Allen Steele _

_Age: 8_

_Status: Prematurely graduated Launchie_

_Effective: Immediately _

Oh, so he must be a pretty skilled soldier if they graduated him so early, Thought Ender. And since Alai still worked with the Launchies, thought Ender, it means that he won't have been damaged by any other teacher.

"Ho, Bean" Called Ender as he logged out of his desk and set it on the edge of the bed.

"Ho, Ender" Called Bean, who was standing by his bunk bed, holding his own desk in his arms. He was going over that days strategies with the special toon that Ender had put him ahead of.

"We've been assigned a new soldier" Said Ender.

"Who?" Asked Bean.

"Allen Steele. He was prematurely graduated from his Launchie group, so I am going to have him assigned to your toon" Ender replied, crossing his arms over is chest.

"Alright"

Ender nodded. Bean seemed to be recalculating things in his mind, thinking of more things he could do with an extra soldier under his wing now. He could have more diversions... though, they would have to move extra carefully due to the extra body on their team.

"Ho, Ender!" Called another Toon leader from across the barracks, who had previously been discussing things with his assistant.

"Ho" Ender called.

"This Allen boy was graduated early like you, Ender" He said, adding stress to the n in his name, "Are you gonna let a fart-mouthed little Launchie boy steal the spotlight?"

Ender marked this as a form of bantering, but did not return it. A commander did not joke with his soldiers, it would give the soldiers this misconception of Ender being lieniant, and a commander was never lieniant.

"Aboslutely not" Ender replied.

The toon leader fell silent, giving up on his bantering.

The doors to the barracks opened.

As far as Ender knew, there were no other females at Battle School other than Petra.

So you could imagine the internal surprise that shot through Ender when he realized Allen was female.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two:

If Ender had experienced any shock he did not show it. He merely suppressed any emotion from showing on his face. Ender was commander, he had to make it look as though he knew that his new recruit was female despite the fact that he didn't.

This girl was what the older boys liked to call "short-stack". She was certainly shorter than the shortest boy in the army, Bean, who was now the second shortest in the army. Bean had felt internal relief when he realized that they couldn't give him a hard time about being short because there was, in fact, someone who stood shorter than him. As well as short, this girl had no shadow of muscle on her body. Her arms resembled very thin poles, the rusted kind that Peter used in the game of Buggers versus Astronauts when he felt creative. Her chestnut hair was pulled back into a scraggly ponytail with a pink, rugged-looking, bow. Her mother must have put that in her hair before she was shipped up into space and she either kept it in for sentimental reasons or did not know how to pull it out. She was young, after all. The worst part about her, thought Ender, were her eyes. They were like Peter's. Always boring into the person they starred at and determining the worth of them, determining what the weakness of that person was and how they could use it against them.

She gave them a dead look. She might as well have been a robot, because no emotion- fear, interest, despair- wore on her face.

"Soldier" Said Ender, who had taken his place in front of his own army, looking down at the girl, "What are your standings in the rankings?" He asked her. He had not checked the standings in a while, all of his soldiers were in the top standings.

Allen starred at him for one moment before turning away and moving to the bunk at the front right of her room, placing a palm on the scanner, spoke her name in a barely audible tone, and moved to the dull metal trunk at the end of the bed where she put in her school uniforms and the one flash suit she had been issued.

Allen Steele had just ignored her commander and military genius Andrew Wiggin.

_I see the game you are playing, Graff. You give me an insubordinate soldier after my army has a perfect zero loss record, has built trust. You figure that if you can't tear me down with unfair rules then you'll rip me up from the inside out. Well, I will not loose the game you have started. I will not let you beat me. Challenge accepted, Colonel Graff _thought Ender.

"When Ender be talking you be answering" said one of the toon leaders, who seemed to be outraged by the actions of this female, as he took a step forward.

Ender raised his hand to halt and silence the toon leader.

"Leave it"

He reluctantly took a step back, his fists shaking slightly in anger. Nobody simply ignored his commander, who had brought them from the bottom up. A pinprick of a girl would not disrespect his commander.

_Leave it. She has already set herself up to fail. In ignoring me she has not gained the admiration of these soldier but has gotten the opposite of that. _

"Practices are from eight in the morning to five in the afternoon. We break for lunch only" Said Ender.

And it was left with that, in a still silence.

Ender Wiggin was determined to break this girl down and build her back up into the perfect soldier.

_Yes, _thought Ender, _I am no better than Graff or any of the adults and administrators, I break things down and build them back up for my own personal needs._


	3. Chapter 3

_**Hello, it's me! Thank you for the follows and comments! It means a lot! When I came back online and saw all of the positive feed back, I was so happy because this is my first story with an original character as a main character and not a side character**_

_**Though I must say, I have yet to see Ender's Game the Movie. I have read the book, which is good. So I may reference things that are not in the movie, or there are things in the movie that are not in the book. Such as in the book, Dragon Army is completely composed of males, so I apologize when I say that, other than Petra, Allen is the only female- because that is how it is composed in the book.**_

_**Also, thank you again for all of your reviews, favorites and follows! It means a lot, since this is the first time I have wrote a fanfiction with an original character as a major part of the story line!  
**_

_**Thank you!**_

Chapter Three:

Ender did not speak to Allen the rest of that morning. If he spoke to her than it meant that he cared enough to try and get her to speak, and that would be equivalent to a loss. And if there was one thing that Ender Wiggin did not do, it was loose.

When Ender got to the practice room, he did not expect to see Allen there. He thought that she would have sat outside of the practice room, perhaps reading off her desk, or stayed in the barracks. But she was there alright, though had been gripping on to the bar handles far away from all the other boys.

_They've already alienated her and she doesn't even seem to have a care in the world that they don't want to be tied to her in any form _thought Ender. She was admirable, he had to admit. Pretending as though you don't care that you're an outcast is a hard thing to do, Ender knew this. When he was in the Rat Army, he had to do this. Though in Salamander it didn't bother him so much because he had the company of Petra, so it wasn't as lonely as it was in Rose the Nose's army.

Ender studied her for a moment then came to a quick conclusion.

Allen hadn't reoriented herself. While everyone was clinging to the top bars, because that in fact was up, she had been clinging to the side bars which she wrongly assumed was down. She still had the gravity-centric way of viewing orientation and that was bad. But, it was a rookie mistake and he couldn't blame her for thinking that way. Only few adolescents knew that in null-gravity, the directions were what you perceived it to be. If he wanted to, up could be down and down could be up or the enemies gate, which everyone thought was down, could be sideways and they could floating on what they called a floor.

Once she began acknowledging his existence he would have to break her from this habit.

Her gun was secured on her hip, though she did not have it drawn. Perhaps she didn't know how to use it. But that was something false to assume. Every Launchie's favorite part of the suit was the gun, it allowed them to interact with the other flash suits around them- that was something everybody knew because they all used to be a Launchie and they all used to love playing with the guns.

"Line up!" Ender commanded sternly.

And his army did as they were told. Their feet came up and pushed off from the wall, they used each other to line up despite the fact that there was lack of gravity.

Ender noticed that Allen was helplessly clinging on to the bar. Either she had no clue how to manuver in null gravity or this was just her insubordination.

He sighed and kicked of from his own spot, doing a few flips before he managed to face his army, which was in top shape.

"Does it seem like I've taught you everything you need to know? That there's nothing else you need to learn?" Asked Ender. This was a trick question which he was sure that they would all fall for.

"Yes sir!" Said all of the army that was lined up, ready for any command.

"No" Allen said softly from the side, "You cannot simply learn everything you need to know. You must continue to learn and to develop, even if it seems as though you cannot develop anymore, in order to defeat the enemy"

"So you speak" Replied Ender, not giving silence the oppurtunity to rear it's ugly head, "But she is correct. Why is it that a short-stack rookie has more common sense than my veteran soldiers?" asked Ender.

Ender hated being commander sometimes. Being commander meant insults, being harsh. Being harsh and giving insults meant no friends. No friends meant no help and no help meant being alone. Ender hated being alone despite the fact he had been his entire Battle School life.

They all glanced over to the female, contempt in their eyes. Not only was she a short-stack, she was _female. _That made the sting burn even worse.

There were a few mumbles and grumbles of content.

Ender looked back to his group as a whole.

"We will practice orientation" Ender said.

His group grumbled again. They had been over reorienting themselves billions and billions and billions of times. This was nothing new at all.

Ender continued his lesson.

Allen did not join in after that.


End file.
